Just A Touch Of Your Hand

A  gorgeous bit of deep soul to start the week.

Al Gardner wasn't the most prolific of artists, as far as I can acertain he only recorded three singles but by god they are all wonderful pieces of soul.

This is probably my favourite, from possibly 1968

Al Gardner - Just A Touch Of Your Hand

The Cure, Balearic?

I was never the biggest fan of The Cure. I don't own any albums but have bought a fair few singles in my time, the first of which was The Love Cats. My favourite is probably Pictures of You.

A few weeks ago I bought a four track 12" called The Balearic Sound Of The Cure, primarily for the original 12 inch version Close To Me  but all four tracks are brilliant and I suppose sound Balearic whatever that may mean. The real gem is the dub mix of Pictures Of You

The Cure - Pictures Of You

It's Friday . . . Let's Dance

When you are reading this I will have embarked upon the long drive to Cornwall for a week of sitting in a different house staring at the rain and moaning. That is if I haven't had enough of the constant bickering from the back seat and turned round and gone home.

Family holidays, you can't beat them.

Anyway, today's track comes from the consistently funky Mr Scruff. Get A Move On was released first in 1999 and again in 2001. If this track dooesn't get your ass moving there is no hope for you.

Mr Scruff had a brilliant tea bar next to where our tent was pitched at Latitude last year. Not only can the Mancunian mix up a storm but he makes a great brew as well. You should check out his shop here for some great music and tea related paraphernalia.

Have a good weekend people.

Mr Scruff - Get A Move On

Flash & Crash

Know absolutley nothing about this track, other than I first became aware of it when it was included on the Instant Garage covermount cd for Mojo. There was probably some info about the track inside the mag which I have long forgotten with no chance of reading again as the mag would have been thrown out in the last great clearout of the cupboard on the half landing.

Just looked it up on Discogs, if you've got a spare eighty quid you couldd own a copy with "scuffs and scratches".

It's a belter.

Rocky & The Riddlers - Flash and Crash.

Jessie Ware

A few weeks ago Gareth over at How Does That One Go Again? posted a Youtube clip from a singer new to me, Jessie Ware which was rather lovely.

I decided to investigate further and found that Miss Ware had released  two collaborations one with SBTRKT and the other with Sampha and a couple of 12" singles under her own name over the last couple of years on some of the hippest labels.

DMCA Police have taken the track down. It's worth the price of the download..

A Serendipitous Meeting

So,  I get this email from Tank, Stiff eldest brother asking " Do you think this is real?".

The email contained an MP3 pertaining to be a collaboration between The Woodentops and Lee Scratch Perry. I listened to it a few times and recognised Perry's tones but couldn't identify the band's contribution.

Before I had a chance to investigate further I received an email from Bat, Stiff's other brother informing us that it was indeed real and enlightened us with the full story.

Apparently,  Perry found himself abandoned by a taxi driver at the wrong studio. Rolo McGinty found him wandering around the studio and invited him in to where the Woodentops were recording while he waited for another taxi. The producer could not help but get involved in the session and they messed around on three tracks which sadly were never finished. The most complete of these is Back To Work where Perry worked on the backing track and laid down his own vocal using the original lyrics and some freestyling.

Woodentops and Lee Scratch Perry - Back To Work

Tell Mama

I don't think that I have ever heard anything that was recorded at the Fame Studio in Muscle Shoals, Alabama that has been any less than very, very good if not excellent and today's track just reinforces that opinion.

In 1967 Leonard Chess arrived at the studios with a pregnant Etta James and to record Tell Mama, possibly my favourite James song which turned out to be the singer's final top ten R&B hit. The flip side of the single, I'd Rather Go Blind,  was also none too shabby either.

Tell Mama also ended up being the title track of the album which was the result of Etta James four trips to Muscle Shoals, released in 1968.

Etta James - Tell Mama

Turning Rebellion Into Money!!

Well it has happened.

When Stiff and I discussed the prospect over a year ago, I truly believed that it couldn't possibly happen that it was just plane (sic) wrong but Stiff said "mark my words before August next year London Calling will be used to advertise something and it will be totally inappropriate".

And so it has come to pass! B fucking A of all people, B bloody A. I hope you are fucking happy Jones, I hope it was worth it. For one of yours and Joe's finest moments to be devalued in such a way and forever to be associated with Willie fucking Walsh, that most enlightened of CEOs.

I could have coped with hearing it all over the BBC's trailers for the games, just but would probably not played the record for six months maybe a year, however now I feel that it is tainted just another product for sale at the right price. Maybe I am being ridiculous but that is how I feel.

As Stiff said, it was inevitable but it does not make it right.

If you have not seen the advert yet, here for one last time before it becomes soiled forever is one of the Clash's no bugger that rock music's finest three and a bit minutes.

Fuck you Mick Jones!

The Clash - London Calling

It's Friday . . . Let's Dance

It has been a really hellish week, especially yesterday, left the house at 04:30 and eventually got home at 22:50 in less than the best of moods but did manage to to get a litre of Bulldog gin at the airport for twenty five quid which may eleviate some of the pain this evening.

What I need is some in your face drum and bass and their is no more in your face than the remix of Shadow Boxing by Nasty Habits possible my favourite piece of music in that genre.

Have a good weekend people.

Nasty Habits - Shadow Boxing (remix)

What's On The Flip Side?

A couple of nights ago as there was bugger all on the TV I decided to spin some northern soul singles and had an urge to play  'They're Talking About Me' by Johnny Bragg. I have had the good fortune to have had this single for a considerable number of years but last night was the first time that I have ever wondered what was on the flip side. I duly played it and although not a patch on the a-side, not many tracks are,  I was pleasantly surprised by what I heard.

See what you think. Apologies for the crackles etc, for something that I have never played it is in quite a bit of a worse state than the other side.

Johnny Bragg - Is It True

Rehab

Here is another one of those mash-ups from The Reflex on the G.A.M.M. label.

I had my reservations of this mix of Amy Winehouse's best song with the backing track to the Velvelettes' Really Saying Something as Rehab is one of my favourtite tracks of the last decade, a song if ever there was one that should have been pressed on 7" but that's by the by.

When I listerned to the mash-up I was pleasantly surprised as the Reflex had opened up the track and if anything using that familiar backing track had made the lyrics even more prominent or maybe that's just me.

The line about Donny Hathaway troubles me though, as that soul singer jumped from a hotel window at the age of 33 after battling with depression. Having Hathaway as a mentor suggests that it was always going to end badly for possibly the outstanding  female singer/songwriter of the last decade. Sad really.

The Reflex - Rehab

Wrote For Luck

It seems no matter where I go these days, someone is talking about the re-formed Stone Roses.

I would just like to take this opportunity to highlight just how brilliant that other band from Manchester, well Salford really,  kicking about at the time could be when they put their minds to it.

Happy Mondays - Wrote For Luck

It's Over

 

Here is a smouldering piece of soul to start the week off with.

It's Over was written by Jimmy Rogers and released on the President label in 1969 and that's about all I know about the record.

Terry Lindsey - It's Over

Tarred and Feathered

The dulcet toned of Johnny Cooke and Dogs have featured here a few times in the past. Here is the acoustic version of Tarred and Feathered which was on the b-side of the Tarred and Feathered single, the fourth single released by the band.

Still think that Dogs is a terrible name for a band.

Dogs - Tarred and Feathered (acoustic)

Wherever You Were

I really quite like Holly Golightly don't know that much about her and don't own that much by her but what I do have get's played quite often.

Here is a track from a very good compilation, My First Holly Golightly Album, which contains tracks from Miss Golightly's first thirteen albums, so is as good a starting point as anywhere. I assure you that if you buy this it won't be long before you are delving deeper into her back catalogue.

Holly Golightly - Wherever You Were

It's Friday . . . Let's Dance

This week Danny Boyle unveiled his plans for the opening ceremony for the London Olympics and his representation of England as a rural idyll. Today we will return to his less than lovely picture of Scotland and Edinburgh in particular in the 1980s in the form of Renton's rant on modern life from Boyle's film version of Irvine Welsh's Trainspotting.

Choose Life by PF Project, for me is a rather pedestrian piece of not very original trance but what makes it memorable is the afore mentioned vitriol courtesy of Ewen McGregor, which is probably why I got asked for it all the time in the pub where I djed at the time.

Have a good weekend people.

PF Project - Choose Life

Love See No Colour

Here is my favourite track from the band Roy Boulter, mentioned yesterday was previously the drummer in. I think that this just edges it over All Together Now due to that single's ubiquity at the time and the fact that it was used to advertise the Clydesdale Bank and also totally inappropriately for me anyway, as the song for the England Euro 2004 campaign.

Love See No Colour was released in 1991 and went to the dizzying heights of number 58 in the UK charts.

The Farm - Love See No Colour 

Of Time And The City

We don't really do high kultchur over the kitchen table, I leave that to people who know about such things such as Adam at Pretending Life Is Like A Song and Mr H, you know where. But I was reading this really good article in An Antidote To Indifference, a publication by the lovely people behind Caught By The River and decided to delve deeper into some of the music mentioned.

Anyway the article written by Roy Boulter, the former drummer of The Farm was about the Terence Davies feature film Of Time And The City a documentary about Liverpool.

By all accounts the most moving section is the one below, it certainly stopped me in my tracks and made me concentrate. A lovely piece of music even although I can't understand a word of it. It really seems to fit perfectly with the images. I played it four or five times on the bounce.

You can purchase An Antidote To Indifference and lots of other interesting things here.

Here

Here is a rather lively piece of housed up Garage courtesy of Deadboy. I featured his remix of Fireworks by Drake the other week. Here was the producer's second single and was released in May last year.

Deadboy - Here

I'm Seventeen Again!

Forgot about the need to run a new scooter in. It took a while to get back from Glasgow, using no more than half throttle.

The Who - The Real Me